Landscape Photography

This area is named after Vernon Golden who was a miner. He donated almost 100 acres to the City of Longmont. The park itself has about 3 miles of trails with many places to take great photos of the lake and mountain reflections.

On most days, you will find people fishing, walking and biking around. Truly a beautiful spot to relax, exercise and enjoy the beauty of nature. Landscape photography here is best in either early spring or early fall when the trees have leaves, and the mountains have snow.

Tip for Photographers - Focal Length
There is a tendency to use a wide angle lens when doing scenic photography. It’s not a bad approach; however, often the photo can be more dramatic if a longer lens is used. Why? The longer lens will enable the background to be brought into the picture and emphasized. I am sure you recall taking landscape pictures or even a panoramic photos only to discover that the mountains are barely visible. The foreground looks good, but the background appears to be inconsequential.

Although there is some debate, it is commonly stated that the human eye has an equivalent focal length of 50mm. This means that when you take a photo with a 50mm lens, the relative scale of the objects will be similar to what you see. If a 24mm or even a 16mm lens is used, the objects in the background will appear significantly smaller than what we see; and possibly what attracted us to that scene will no longer be evident.

Often I will use a focal length between 70-100mm for shots like this one. It brings the background up close and as in this image, the duck is visible as a bonus effect.